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What's Stopping You Building Your Next Project with an FPGA? (Please, Don't Blame the Cost!)

rscasny

The community does a ton of projects with MCUs. If they do the job for you, that's great. But the element14 community is about learning, experimenting and roadtesting. In this spirit, I am proposing that you should try building your next project with an FPGA (SoC), if it suits the application, of course. What's stopping you? Oh, some members have voiced the cost issue. Granted, some FPGAs do cost a lot. But chip manufacturers are rolling out economical chipsets that most makers, pro-makers or experienced hobbyists can afford. (If you can't, then apply to a RoadTest and if you win you can get a dev board for FREE.) I think FPGA / SoCs will move into a more important place for electronic designers, especially for IoT applications. Perhaps it's time to experiement with one. What's stopping you?

 

Here's a link to a current roadtest:Digilent ARTY S7 Dev Board (Xilinx Spartan 7)   Apply today!

 

Randall Scasny

RoadTest Program Manager

  • in reply to shabaz

     

    Could you point us to some of those resources (especially the free ones or less expensive ones), I know I don't have much time at the moment but FPGAs are something I'm keen to learn.

     

    Kas

  • in reply to kas.lewis

    Hi Kas,

     

    The good free resources are quite sparse unfortunately : (

    I like the free lecture notes here: E2.1 Digital Electronics 2 - Peter Cheung

    In terms of books, most are very expensive : ( but the semi-affordable ones I'm using to learn are:

    VHDL for Engineers (Kenneth L) and The Student's Guide to VHDL (Peter Ashenden). That latter book is affordable.

    I always try to get at least two books on a subject, so I can compare and read from another perspective if something is hard to follow.

    For digital electronics, those same lecture notes are useful, plus 'Contemporary Logic Design' (Randy Katz) is low-cost.

  • in reply to shabaz

    Just after I hit "Add Reply"  I searched coursera and edX and found one course on FPGAs and two on VLSI. My issue with online courses is the lack of "motivation". Since I do them as free courses it's amazing how they always seem low priority. What would be cool is if I could do it with someone. Even if its just to compare where I'm holding in the course with. Any takers image , the FPGA course could be a helpful beginning...

     

    Kas

  • in reply to kas.lewis

    Also try Udemy. I am taking their Intro to VHDL course. I got it for $9.99USD for New Year's offer. They have others besides that one. Typical cost as of today, $15USD.

  • in reply to recurzive

    Your comment would be more credible if you had provided reasons why this product is garbage and crap.

     

    Taking your base cost of 103 pounds which currently is roughly $145USD, is it really possible to build a functional computer with that amount? Maybe, if you do low (low) end.

     

    One month's worth of food? Is that for one person on a strict diet? Perhaps the cost of living is less where you live.

     

    If your comment is indicative that you will not be applying for this road test then I am sure that the other applicants thank you wholeheartedly :-) Regards.

  • I think the answer to recurzive's rather cynical "the price of everything and the value of nothing" comment is that creative people need to create, and if you want to create digital logic even £103 for an FPGA board is quite cheap compared to what we used to have to do.  It would be like saying "why are you paying $3000 for a used oboe and $40 per week on lessons when you can pick up a bunch of used CDs with oboists who are better than you'll ever be."  Well, creating something -- music, writing, woodworking, software, digital designs, etc. etc. -- is totally different from consuming it.  Sure, you can write software for what a lot of hobbyists do with FPGA boards, but that's not the point.  Digital design is a wonderful creative ability and watching your creation working is much more thrilling than watching a simulation of it on a computer.  It's "The Feeling of Power", as Isaac Asimov put it.  JMO/YMMV

     

    ["The price of everything" is from Oscar Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan.]

  • in reply to kas.lewis

    Clive "Max" Maxfield's Bebop to the Boolean Boogie is a good intro to digital logic for the newbie.  You can get first editions for a few bucks and second editions for only a little more.  The beauty of digital logic is that very little has changed since the 20th Century.  The cost per logic function keeps going down, but the basic theory of gates and ALUs really hasn't.  This means you don't need the latest edition of anything and you can get by with cheap used copies.  (I like abebooks.com)

     

    You might have luck at your local public library.  That's how I got started with this in the 1970s, but I was lucky to have a public library with a terrific collection of electronics and computer books.

  • in reply to kas.lewis

    You can also take a look at the following course made available by NPTEL India

    http://nptel.ac.in/courses/117108040/

    It covers Digital System Design, VHDL, PLDs and FPGAs.

     

    I was fortunate enough to attend this course in an actual classroom

  • in reply to johnbeetem

    Good call ,  I have really enjoyed Clive's writings (although I don't believe that I have read this one).

    Gene